SOS Schools in Angola

SOS Nursery School Benguela

The SOS Nursery School is open each weekday, with sessions from 08:30am until16:00pm. There are currently 116 children aged from three to five years on roll. Of these, 14 are receiving a scholarship to attend. 10 children in attendance live in the SOS Children’s Village. At the SOS Nursery School the vast majority comes from wider geographical areas outside of the main catchments. One of the most exciting events for the children in 2008 was definitely the regular outings organised by the nursery school.

Apart from the regularly outing for nature and environmental studies, children are also taken into the wider community to places of interest which enables them to have a wider range of activities and opportunities to increase their awareness within the local area. These ranged from walks to the nearby river to trips to the Museums and Art exhibition and visits to various factories.

This year the Christmas social included entertainment by the children, a 'special' guest, lots of food and the yearly Christmas raffle.

SOS Primary School Benguela

The SOS Primary School has up to 480 pupils in 12 classrooms. There are also two vocational training rooms and a sports field.

Given the huge number of children not attending school in the area where the school is established and following the millennium goals for all children to have an easy access to the primary education, we decided to redefine the maximum capacity in the SOS Primary School Lubango where an opportunity was identified to accommodate more needy children. The school became a double stream school with different groups attending academic classes in both periods of the day.

As part of the process to complete the first cycle of the three years secondary education (from grade 7 to grade 9), the school has successfully introduced the grade 7 academic programme.  Likewise, a computer training programme for grade 7 students was also initiated in the SOS Primary School as an extracurricular study.

In order to prepare children to start income generating activities or take on employment opportunities, a cookery course initially enrolling 25 carefully selected children (10 from the SOS Children’s Village Lubango and 15 from the community) was started in the SOS Primary School Benguela. The selection took into consideration the development plans of target SOS children and the existing needs among grown-up ones from the most deprived communities.

SOS Primary School Lubango

The SOS Primary School has up to 680 pupils in 18 classrooms. There are also three vocational training rooms and a sports field. There is also a parallel programme for children from the local community who are given basic literacy classes. These children are hopefully absorbed later into the scholarship programme at the school.

Latest report from 2008 from the SOS Primary School Lubango

The 2008 school year was the SOS School’s eleventh year of operation. The school opened its doors to students for the first time on February, 1998.

This educational establishment houses primary education  of six years (from grade 1 to grade 6) followed by a first cycle secondary education of three years (from grade 7 to grade 9). The student population is divided into three categories namely; SOS children (108); children coming from the Family Strengthening Programme (30); deprived children coming from the surrounding community (182) and fee paying children (361).

The big question the school management is posing itself recently is on how the school can make sure it is meeting the learning needs of individual pupils. Big and mixed ability classes poses a great challenge for teachers to tailor their teaching to meet the needs of every pupil, including study support. The school was tasked to include approaches that personalise learning, and provide teaching and support for children of all abilities and in all circumstances, including children with SEN and disabilities, gifted and talented children, minority ethnic children and children performing below the expected level for their age.

The SOS school open day is celebrated on November 22nd.  This is an open day when the school hosts numerous fun activities in order to bring all of the school families together!

SOS Nursery School Lubango

In a country where pre-education was given an extremely low priority within national educational plans on the assumption that it could be mostly provided at home, the SOS Nursery School Lubango has rapidly conquered the status of the best Nursery School in the province among many others run by private bodies. In the SOS Lubango Nursery School, staff members are highly competent in their working roles.

Children from different backgrounds benefit from teacher’s wealth of experience and childcare training. Teachers plan a diverse range of inspirational activities linked to themes, which children can relate to. The SOS Nursery School has approximately 125 students which are split up into five groups.

Children learn about differing roles of people who help us, such as paramedics, fire fighters and police officers when given a practical talk and tour of their vehicles. This helps children develop a positive attitude to others. In addition, children have access to a range of outdoor and indoor activities which contribute to their good health. The large fully enclosed front garden has an area for children to play safely, where they have access to outdoor jungle gym which helps to promote their gross motor skills. In 2008 the SOS Nursery School ended the year with a big picnic and barbeque. The day included a multicultural activity and lots of special games for children and adults.